This is with intent, I want my yard flooded with mint. I have always dreamed of being in a position where I can just destroy my yard with mint, and now I finally can.
Is there anything else I can toss in the yard with it though? I know mint chokes everything out but surely there's gotta be soooomething out there I can toss in with it, mostly just for a lil visual variation.
I'm not worried about maintaining grass or anything. I just want mint guys.
I am like a mint goat. I will go out back and mow the mint down by bending over and eating the plants - stem, leaves, and all - I just need to know if there is absolutely anything at all I can plant with it.
Lemon balm can compete, as it is basically a type of mint. I inherited a garden plot with both, and they actually coexist and keep the bindweed and Bermuda grass in check. I would rather pull up mint than Bermuda grass or bindweed any day.
I do like lemon balm! Great for bedtime teas
Oregano is another one that can compete with mint, especially in the hotter parts of the garden where the mint is less happy.
Yes! My mom’s got a bed full of half mint and half oregano and they’ve been happy together for years. Every year some milkweed comes up in it, too!
Wouldn’t cat nip work too?? I’m pretty sure it’s in the mint family
But that has the side effect of attracting cats who may poop in the yard doesn’t it?
But the mint smell covers it
Probably not a guarantee though. I have several mints and lemon balm in a patch which doesn't have too strong a smell unless disturbed/mowed. One year I had 2 or 3 cat-nip plants in the same area and there was a pretty powerful, lingering marijuana-like scent that had me slightly paranoid because at the time it was much more illegal and I cared more about the thoughts of neighbors.
This is totally unimportant to the topic at hand but this year I am planting the cat-nip again and will celebrate this small victory of not caring what anyone thinks with my little cat buddy. She has taught me much through the years with her indifferent gaze
Oregano is also a great pest deterrent planted with Sage also
Oooh good one! That is useful to know.
Oooh I accidentally did something good
WAIT WHAT, AND YES I AM SHOUTING. Something controls BIND WEED, the worst agricultural weed in the US?
Not controls, exactly. It successfully competes in one corner of my community garden plot, so that the bindweed doesn't grow there much in comparison to the rest of the plot. The bindweed grows everywhere else with abandon, but in that corner it is barely noticeable. It is reduced to a few spindly little plants that I dig out immediately.
I keep the mint from taking over everything by pulling it all up twice a year, which allows me to harvest it while keeping it under control.
I planted mint in a tree pit in the parking lot of the community garden, and it did overpower the bindweed. It grows happily with California poppies and cilantro, which self seed every year. There is no longer any bindweed there, and I didn't pull it up. It is great in the tree pit because it can't escape easily.
I choked mine out with blue mistflower. Absolutely obliterated.
Oooh good to know! I've never planted blue mist flower. Time to Google!
How much do you have? Keep plucking it at ground level and it will eventually give up and fester angrily underground.
That was google's advice and it worked for me.
Worked for me too. Part of my evening routine was admiring the sunset while pulling bindweed vines, and not even that many. I love the stuff, but sometimes you want more than one plant.
Ha, it was my morning routine, before it got hot. My dog is an obscenely early riser.
It mostly worked for me, but as it is a community garden, and some of my plot neighbors don't weed very often, it just keeps coming back. So, the middle of the plot and 2 sides are pretty good, and the other 2 sides keep getting bindweed. The mint and lemon balm are in the corner between the 2 bad sides, which helps to keep the bindweed under control there.
Ohhhh. That’s is rough.
Mine grew in a couple of large, central beds that I’d put wire fencing around as a gentle reminder to the dog she didn’t belong there. (If she wanted in, it was useless.)
By July 4, bindweed erased the fencing. It was maddening.
Oh man, lemon balm pesto is absolutely incredible. And it's so good in soup. Seconding the lemon balm as a functional and delicious competitor!
Can confirm. Someone fell for the scam of "planting in pots in the ground will contain it," and the gardens at my new house are OVERRUN with mint & lemon balm.
Dutch clover as ground cover. Lavender, lemongrass, marigolds, carrots.
You could always plant some forget-me-nots.
A very colorful contrast to the shades of mint green
Any bee balm.
LMFAO 😂 😂
lol
I swear to god, if it spreads to my yard I’m coming back to this thread and shaking my fist.
Just wait, in a few years we’ll all have mint magically grow in our yard.
I saw elsewhere in here OP is in Nebraska. I’m in southern Ontario, so there’s a minimum 62% chance it does spread to me.
More than that, you'd better get off this sub. Mint has figured out how to spread via internet. We are doomed.
Don’t you mean….Mintbraska????
Shaking my Mojito
I went to a kitchen garden once where they had huge deep beds with all different kinds of mint - black mint, spearmint, strawberry mint, chocolate mint etc etc. you could just plant different varieties in each corner of your garden and let them fight it out?
Hunger Games: Mint Edition
May the odds be ever in your flavour
To start your line up, in my garden apple mint is far more aggressive than strawberry mint, and I had to rescue a strawberry mint and transplant elsewhere. The apple mint patch is where the chickens are allowed free range as well for their dustbaths - the more I abuse it, the more it thrives. It and the violets tend to coexist peacefully.
I completely forgot about the time I had apple mint and chocolate mint.
I have a local space that used to be a community garden, do the most random goddamn mint species love to pop right up! They've escaped into a field that doggos like to run around in.
Let's goooooo
Ooh you could plant wisteria too and let it take over any trees
This is my plan. I’m going to let spearmint and the regular supermarket variant fight it out in a pot, I’m preparing cuttings for this deathmatch lol
In my experience, if it’s really wet the spearmint will win and if it’s rather dry the regular mint wins. With proper watering they both seem happy
I am basically doing this with mints, nasturtium , and native strawberries and I am ridiculously excited. The bees will be SO HAPPY and there will be no damn grass or bindweed.
i have my mints (5 kinds last year) in a big green metal planter and call it BATTLEMINTS!
I think I'm in the wrong sub. Y'all seem a little twisted lol.
This is what I did… planted catnip, spearmint and peppermint in the same bed to watch the battle
Catnip Evergreen!
Don't settle just for culinary mint. Assuming you're in the eastern half of North America: Add some Bee Balm and Mountain Mints. Wild Bergamot, Virginia Mountain Mint, and Clustered Mountain Mint will add texture and diversity to a mint obsession. You can use low-growing Downy Wood Mint if you've got shade. All are edible and smell amazingly minty, but they're a bit more bitter than culinary mints so aren't quite as good (or maybe are more of a delicacy?). You'll love the pollinators that come to visit you.
I planted native mountain mint and the bees go wild for it! I actually love the earthiness of it compared to culinary mint and it makes my back yard smell amazing. It grows pretty tall though so it's not going to replace grass unless you're looking to do something more prairie-like.
The bees love my mountain mint more than anything else I've planted, but the hummingbirds love the scarlet bee balm! Both are awesome.
For an aggressive native trifecta plant goldenrod. I allowed some to volunteer in my yard and now it's everywhere
Mountain mint isn’t really a spreader like other varieties. At least not in my yard. I keep my other mint fully contained.
Strawberries! They're supposedly companion plants
I do love strawberries. They can taste very refreshing together
Birds think the same.
My backyard neighbor has a lil bird sanctuary going on. Maybe my wild garden can help!
I played Viva Piñata as a kid, and now I spend my adult life adding things in my garden to attract specific animals I want to see like in the game. 🤣
I saw some beautiful bohemian wax wings in the yard across from me eating berries bushes so I got some of my own to lure them over.
I have stray cats taking shits in my raised beds and tree ring, but the minute berries pop out and birds coming down to eat them WHILE THE CATS FUCKING CHILL FROM A DISTANCE.
Either they're looking at their meal being fattened up or enjoy the destruction of my garden.
Alpines is a better choice for being in the lawn. They won’t get got by the mower.
I spread clover around my backyard for the past two summers and then I walked out this spring to discover it was all wild strawberries
I had to completely abandon and burn down a strawberry bed that got mint in it. The strawberries definitely cannot compete. The strawberries have been gone for 10 year, I RoundUped the space, and planted it to grass. I'm still finding mint.
I put chocolate mint in the ground one year. I was promised invasion. The thing did not survive the winter.
But the potted one, did.
With mint, there is no reason. No trust.
Seems like mint is the chaotic neutral of the gardening world
Agree with above commenter. We put 4 kinds of mint in and only one survived and it stays well contained to where we planted it. Many mojitos to you in the future 🤙🏼
Same, our mint died off. However, the strawberry plant we put in one year is now on year 3 and has spread out of the container, over the ground and to two other containers. I don't even know how that happened but it's an awesome thing. It's gone rogue. We also had a rogue tomato plant last year when we did NOT plant tomatoes.
Oh I did this too! So far the chocolate mint has been staying in his one little section of the flower bed. I think he gets enough water and shade in this specific area, but if he creeps any further it's too hot and dry and he hates it lol.
Same. Lemon balm and mints, they just don't seem to stick in my yard.
Meanwhile I have a rhubarb I moved and everywhere it touched or dropped a piece of root it's grown. I have strawberries growing randomly all over, I never even planted strawberries. Just weird what chooses to stay.
Kinda want to see a fight between mint and violets now.
Ok I’ll send you a picture of my front yard lol
Edit: ok wow I didn’t think so many people would want to see my yard?? here’s a quick pic I snapped this morning— head of our neighborhood association was out and I ran back inside before he could see me/talk my ear off. I am working on ripping out all the grass so this can become entirely mint and violets, maybe I’ll update again next year??
Can I have a picture too? Sounds dreamy
Oh, boy. I need a picture, please.
I can send you a picture of blackberry vs mountain mint, if that's at all interesting to you.
Edit: Multiple pictures. I have Mountain mint vs blackberries and then I also have wood sorrel vs violets (I think it's violets). Some of the blackberries I planted but the blackberries that are growing between the mountain mint are wild. Didn't intentionally plant wood sorrel or violets but we wanted the area to be taken over by the wood sorrel because we don't have to mow there and then this year the violets popped up. The blackberries and mint will probably be more interesting next year or later this year. https://imgur.com/a/1e91gzA
That sounds so pretty lol, let’s see the battleground!
!remindme 2 days
Me too? :-)
Show me!
Invasive? They are a native wildflower in Illinois. I propagates em where I sees em.
Native in Georgia and larval host for Greater Fritillary butterflies. They're welcome in my yard.
They're tasty too. I just love them in salads but people do all kinds of fancy stuff with them, like jelly.
Mint flower smell really lovely too. Very minty but a little sweeter/floral. Kind of reminds me of those little pillow mints.
I specifically do not put broadleaf killer on my yard because I love the violets.
I have wild violets all over my yard. That and lots of different types of clover/ground cover, so we just mow and let it do its thing. It’s really pretty once things start blooming
I made the mistake of planting violets. I now bow down to my violet overlords.
Ohhh do the Violet overlords defeat creeping charlie and mock strawberry? I’m slowly getting my violets to move to the invaded side of the yard where they’ll meet 🤞
My violets don't seem to be winning against the mock strawberry. They do seem to mostly coexist. The violets are winning against everything else in my wet shady backyard.
I love bees!
Yay, me too! I hope you'll consider using a native mint, to support your local native pollinators (many of which are facing extinction) versus the invasive European honeybees that are displacing them. I don't know where you're gardening, but there's a great resource HERE where you can put in your address, and it'll provide a list of the plant species that are keystones (critical) to supporting pollinator systems in that area. If you're in New England, there's also THIS AMAZING LIST of "native plant species preferred by imperiled bee and butterfly species." <3
They're also native, at least to the Eastern US
Catnip. Become leader of the Cat Army.
I have two catnip plants in pots. I WILL BE THE NEIGHBORHOOD (catnip) DEALER. I AM SPEAKING IT INTO EXISTENCE.
I have catnip in a pot outside my door. It doesn't grow well because my cats keep laying in it and biting it.
'1000km away' SO IT WAS YOU!
Oregano is a cousin of mint.
I have so much oregano in my garden. I have not planted any oregano anywhere. I pull it out when I see it and it’ll reappear a couple of weeks later. Can confirm.
Basil, thyme, rosemary, lavender, and tons of other herbs are in the mint family. It's pretty broad.
Was looking for this answer! I struggle to grow mint in my garden but oregano is a menace that cannot be contained.
What do you DO with that much of it?? Mint, you can use up tons with a single mojito party but oregano… it’s like oh I made gallons of red sauce, so glad we used up that one bunch of oregano.
I have this problem too. I use it sometimes in dressings or marinades, but it’s a relatively strong flavor so ya only need a little. Meanwhile the plant is so huge it’s knocking on my door and asking/threatening to come inside.
My area has super hard soil, so the in-ground mint seems easily kept in check by the mugwort, clover, and alyssum.
The worst sin was committed by whoever developed lawn bermuda grass to develop dense, spreading rhizomes that regrow from a tiny piece and choke the soil down to 2 feet.
And the common bermuda doesn’t even have a nice texture to it. It’s so coarse. I unfortunately have a patch of it (probably originated from a neighbors yard). I gave up the idea of trying to kill it and planted Zoysia plugs and white clover. If my yard has to be an aggressive plant battleground, I might as well have a dog in the fight against the bermuda grass, mugwort, stiltgrass, crab grass and small carpet grass
🌿 I AM LIKE YOU I PLANTED OUT LEMON BALM AND SELF HEAL LET THE GAMES BEGIN
(also I have a few acres and asked my nearest neighbor, my mother in law who is a Master Gardener, if she'd be upset if I made this happen, and she said "Go to town.")
Our property is all curly dock and thistles. The lemon balm came back this year, I also planted out chamomile.
Bro, I'm excited for us. Let's have it gooooooo THIS IS OUR LIFE WE DO WHAT WE WANT
I accidentally threw a clipping four years ago.. this is now.. before I pulled them out. Every single year I'm fighting with it.
Honestly that looks beautiful
That happened with me & bee balm. I keep digging it up and putting it in the area it’s SUPPOSED to be and yet, there it is anew and laughing at me each spring and none of the stuff is growing where I’m intentionally planting it
Here's the ugly truth about mint.
You won't get that thick bed either. You'll get a messy, stretched out assortment of runners with leggy stalks. And also nothing will grow.
I would love a lawn of mint, but she's a cruel little rascal.
See, that's because you aimed for bed. If you'd aimed at keeping it contained, you'd have gotten a lush bed
Yeah I aimed for a few to circle a little man made pond (like 3x3ft), got a lovely thick 20ft blanket of mint. Looked like I did it on purpose so I was always like “heh yeahhhh got a green thumb I guess heh”
Edit: it was contained by rosemary that I also unintentionally created a monster hedge out of.
Oh I don't need it to be perfectly aesthetic by any means. Really I am trying to move further away from the uniform grass lawn look. Some straggly mint plants, some other things that will thrive in the ground, thats all I need.
Honestly, just mow it off every once in a while. It will get rid of the messy.
And it smells great when you mow it.
Why, tho? Like of all the dreams to have, why this?
I ingest an unreasonable amount of mint year round, and I just dream of being able to walk outside and be blasted by that sweet delicious earthy fresh-mint smell, walk over to a mint plan, and snip off a good bit to put in my tea or water or anything. It is really a whole lifestyle commitment over here
Just buy as many varieties of mint as you can so you have a minty jungle
I done this before and I regretted it. Ripped out my mint as it choked out other crops. I still have mint in areas I'm too lazy to reach to. The smell of mint and rue is highly aphrodisiac to me
I ingest an unreasonable amount of mint year round
Translation: Mojito parties are on at OPs house this year.
I hope your neighbors have solid defenses between you because otherwise that's a war crime.
They have a weird barrier thing between our yards because their dogs are always digging at the fence. Hopefully all goes well!
I think you're in my top 5 Redditors ever encountered. Good luck with your mint.
Unpopular opinion but native mint in your yard is great. I plant it everywhere I don't want to mow close to like fences and telephone poles and then just mow when it grows too far out.
Yes, don't put it in your flowerbeds unless you want it to take that whole area. But pollinators love it and it's great fresh and dry for tea and dressing
So yes plant the mint
You can put in thyme, if your climate allows them to survive the winter. Also, chives. Chives definitely likes to sow itself around, and our thyme slowly creeps out and about like little flat bushes, or heather. Both thyme and chives have managed to withstand the encroaching mint we had next to it, too.
(We did end up killing the mint - we think - but I wish you good luck with yours. If you do add some thyme and chives, you're gonna have the smelliest herbal lawn in the neighborhood, love that)
I'd love it if when people walk on the sidewalk and pass our house they smell an array of different plants and herbs
We did lemon balm, mint, and catnip. 7 years later it’s still a cage match between mint/lemon balm. Yard smells great though! The mint does get a bit gangly late in summer as an FYI. Definitely not as nice as spring early summer foliage.
If you can't handle mint at its long and awkward you don't deserve at its cute and foliage-y
I'm loving your energy
quaking aspen trees and bamboo
You have turned a psychopath into a full blown genocidal maniac with this comment.
Good on you.
😂😂😂 best troll response, my bamboo battle feels endless
Noooo not the dreaded bamboo!
Don’t forget Oregon grape, to make sure you get stabbed everywhere!
Someone who has not yet been born thanks you for the mint they are still harvesting in 2130.
Yarrow
My neighbors planted chocolate mint in with their grass. It smells amazing when mowed and isn't taking over.
This is giving me ideas....
Does it have to be regular mint? I went native and threw mountain mint in one space and it’s going bonkers :) My golden ragwort is headed into a showdown with it, with its compatriot wood poppy in the shadier areas :)
For sunnier areas maybe some yarrow and bee balm would probably do battle :)
(This sounds like glorious chaos to me and I love it)
My husband and I live in a house that was flipped after about 50 years of being “that” house in the neighborhood. The yard was used as a landfill more or less for all that time and trying to get anything to grow has been a nightmare. But you know what started to take in this trashed, compacted worthless clay soil in the places I couldn’t or wouldn’t amend? Mint! I have mint everywhere. It’s in the ground. And when it spreads too far I’ll just take a weed whacker to it. I plan on harvesting enough this year to give away mint tea for Christmas. The mint police can come for me, I dare them.
I just got a big hunk of mint root and I’m trying to decide which part of my lawn to let to take over. 😈
I grew up in the pnw and vividly remember running through a mint patch my parents kept in the middle of the yard (omg the smell!) for most of my childhood. We mowed around it and it stayed basically the same size for over a decade, sadly we moved and I missed it very much.
I’ve been trying this for years. Somebody tell me what the heck kind of mint you’re planting that takes over, I want it!!
Lemon balm. In the mint family. Makes great tea that’s relaxing enough to make your kids take a nap.
If you are absolutely going to commit to this atrocity, go all in. Plant everything in the mint family. Wild bergamot, lemon balm, basil, mountain mint, catmint.
Godspeed you madlad/lass
Don't listen to the haters! I have a whole mint garden where I collect different varieties of mint. They're not invasive, they're successful. I have a bird bath that is filled with pebbles for bees to rest on while they drink. It's lovely.
I am trying to do the same with blackberries. My neighbor warned me they will take over and I'm like ".... Good". Meanwhile I'll go to Aldi this weekend and look like a lunatic buying like 20 cartons of blackberries bc they are on sale and blackberries are life
Ohhhh lavender! It will smell heavenly
What about native mint species?
Thats something I would love to plant
I have a mint garden and I love it! Congratulations! I'm trying to collect as many different varieties as I can find. Mint is amazing and hybridizes well.
Strawberries and cherry tomatoes are also said to be very dominant.
You’re my soul sister. 😆
I’ve done this in every garden I’ve ever been in and I’m going to do it to my lawn one day too. I love me my man-sized mint patches.
In my experience prostrate vetch can compete with mint, crimson clover too, though it’s a bit tall and less nice to walk on.
There was mint all through my previous yard on one side. It kept other weeds away and smelled delightful every time we mowed. It was never a problem. It was the shady side, if that makes any difference.
You and many of the commenters have mentioned that it seems like mint likes shade
Yeess! One of us! I planted all my problematic plants together. Lemon balm, mint, oregano, thyme and those little chick and hen guys. Year three and the only thing I noticed is lemon balm loves my garden, mint only just survives but still shows up in random places every year and they all smell great! To be honest I did plant the mint in a pot first, but it was Not having it.
Piss off the neighbors with this one little trick…
I was thinking about intentionally planting mint where I have a poison ivy problem. I’d much rather have a mint problem.
Plant mint, stevia and lemon balm together. When it becomes your lawn, just rip up a handful, muddle it and throw it in a drink. Sounds like a good summer plan
Don’t throw it all away for one momentary urge! You are (currently) loved. Please reconsider! 🤣
I'd been contemplating this for a long time. I really think I wanna do it!
Yes! This is the chaos I live for. I've got my mint in pots right now but I'd be okay if it spilled over into the yard. Freshly mowed mint, oh man.
your neighbors are going to hate you
My love for mint trancends my tolerance of my neighbors
Zinnias. They are hardy and like poor soil. You can buy a giant bag of seeds, throw them out and water them in and at least some will grow. They will reseed themselves and you will be the flower lawn guy. Cut them and some mint sprigs for bouquets.
Orange mint is less invasive and smells great!
Creeping thyme works well it also smells good Btw, how do you bait kits feel about a mint assault on their yards?
I have purposely planted mint. I love seeing it much better than grass and it still mows
i rent and if my landlord ever pisses me off, i'm planting mint in his front and backyard just before we move out.
I have a small food forest in which edible ground cover have to fight grass and horsetail. I put at least five types of mint in (apple mint, chocolate mint, blackberry mint, ginger mint and Moroccan mint), in addition to other hostile takeover plants. They’re my grass fighting army amd they’re doing a great job
Plant in ground oregano, strawberries, catnip, sunchokes and lemon balm. Sit back and watch which one wins. Probably still the mint. But at least give it a fair fight.
I have spearmint and oregano in mine along with the peppermint. It smells amazing all the time.
Imagine if someone crossed mint with bamboo.
Bamboo, broken glass, unexploded ordnance are also in the same category.
I know it's a gardening sin, but I too have put mint in the ground. It's for anti erosion I swear!
Live your best mint life!
This has been a fun read, thanks for posting OP!
May you always find yourself surrounded by minty love <3
You are chaos, I like you.
I love mint too. I planted some as a kid not realizing how invasive it was. Last summer (20 years post planting) I stopped by my parents house. Dad was mowing the lawn and the whole neighborhood smelled like mint. I laughed so hard at the realization that even though the garden i planted no longer exists and he’s been mowing it down for years it still is surviving in his lawn. I promptly went out and got some for my yard. Someday I hope my lawn smells pretty too.
Chives are impossible to kill, easy to grow and have very pretty purple flowers.
I have a contained area with Mint, oregano and thyme. The oregano easily out competes the mint. The thyme does okay too, though I do need to pull some mint once and a while. That said, my mint always ends up with rust half way through the season and its basically useless culinarily by that point.
Honestly, it smells amazing when you cut the mint and grass together. Like a late 90’s Bath and Body Works scent!
Dawn of the Planet of the Mints
Please keep us updated! I would love to see photos of your deal with the devil.
I recently transferred some Wild Bergamot that was over taking a flower bed (it was blocking out my cardinal flowers, okay?) to the back of the yard that borders a forested ravine. I want that beautiful, vigorous baby to grow as big as it wants. Even better if it out competes the invasive honey suckle.
Hope you’re not in an HOA.
When we bought this house I specifically went for not an HOA because of this dream of mine
Fuck HOA 🤟
This level of dedication strikes fear into my very soul.
We turned down two houses because they were in HOA’s.
Do you just hate your neighbours or what?
Get a few different varieties of mint! I have a strawberry mint that is always a hit when people come over
We have a large mint patch that is fun to mow over because it smells so good. Mowing does seem to keep it someone contained.
I did it too. I prefer a fight with mint than foxtail and mint is not dangerous for my dogs.
Add some blackberry or raspberry bushes to really commit to the bit. The future owner of your home will curse you for decades
My desert primrose and hollyhocks give the mint a good fight if they get the chance. I just yanked a bunch of mint to give some baby hollyhocks some room. It grows all around the chicken coop. They love it, so they got some, and I put a bunch in the coop. I live in a harsh desert climate, so I'm for anything green.
Rum and some lime should compliment it well
I literally started this journey last summer. It's the best when you go to mow it down.
Yolo. Or in your case tomorrow. You only mint once
I've reported this post as self-harm.